“Longtime televangelist and senior Pastor of New Destiny Christian Center in Apopka, Florida, Paula White offered her followers an Easter Sunday deliverance from a spiritual death sentence for a $1,144 “resurrection seed,” she says was set by God. Preaching the story of Lazarus who Jesus resurrected from the dead in John 11:38-44, White promised believers in a video appeal that if they would sow the seed and have faith, she believed deliverance would come.”

Ms. White is in many ways, an example of the “prosperity gospel“, a movement that claims God, through Jesus Christ, shows divine favor on some by blessing them with wealth.

“I’ve been getting regular emails from White’s ministry for two-three years now, and 99% of them involve an appeal for financial donations, sometimes in exchange for a book, DVD set or some other teaching product. This isn’t unusual — plenty of nonprofits, religious or otherwise, solicit donations in exchange for gifts. I know this partly because I have been reporting on Evangelicalism/Christianity for the past five years or so. I am also a Christian, who practices tithing and tries to make generosity a spiritual practice.

Paula White’s email appeals for financial donations are different. Here’s what I mean.

White uses Bible passages to suggest that certain blessings are tied to them and that donating an amount matching the numbers of those verses will lead to some kind of reward for the giver.“

In many ways, the prosperity gospel is very much similar to the Catholic Church’s use of indulgences pre-reformation. Prior to the Protestant reformation and the Catholic reformation, it used to be customary church policy for people to buy away their sins. This angered many leading intellectuals at the time, who found the practice temporal and unsavory.